A novel CuCl2/BIL catalyst for direct oxidation of alcohol to acid at ambient temperature

A clean and highly efficient alcohol oxidizing system, using hydrogen peroxide in the presence of CuCl2/Bifunctional ionic liquid (CuCl2/BIL), under solvent free condition has been developed. The oxidation proceeds smoothly with 0.01 mmol of CuCl2/BIL and 30% of H2O2 to give the carboxylic acids with excellent yield. Especially, this green reaction also exemplifies advances toward the synthesis of aliphatic and aromatic acid from the corresponding alcohol. The advantages of the present protocol include solvent free condition, wide functional group tolerance and convenient product isolation. The BIL can be recycled and reused for five runs without any significant loss of its activity. (C) 2012 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.